My conviction, however, was not evidence, and I felt that I should need even more than my wonted good fortune to bring the black crime home to the real perpetrator. For the present, at all events, I must keep silence--a resolve I found hard to persist in at the examination of the accused wife, an hour or two afterwards, before the county magistrates. Jackson had hardened himself to iron, and gave his lying evidence with ruthless self-possession. He had _not_ desired Mrs. Rogers to purchase sulphuric acid; had _not_ received any from her. In addition also to his testimony that she and her husband were always quarrelling, it was proved by a respectable person that high words had passed between them on the evening previous to the day the criminal offence was committed, and _that_ foolish, passionate expressions had escaped her about wishing to be rid of such a drunken wretch. This evidence, combined with the medical testimony, appeared so conclusive to the magistrates that spite of the unfortunate woman's wild protestations of innocence, and the rending agony which convulsed her frame, and almost choked her utterance, she was remanded to prison till that day week, when, the magistrates informed her, she would be again brought up for the merely formal completion of the depositions, and be then fully committed on the capital charge. I was greatly disturbed, and walked for two or three hours about the quiet neighborhood of Farnham, revolving a hundred fragments of schemes for bringing the truth to light, without arriving at any feasible conclusion. One only mode of procedure seemed to offer, and that but dimly, a hope of success. It was, however, the best I could hit upon, and I directed my steps towards the Farnham orison. Sarah Purday had not yet, I remembered, been removed to the county jail at Guilford. "Is Sarah Purday," I asked the turnkey, "more reconciled to her position than she was?" "She's just the same--bitter as gall, and venomous as a viper." This woman, I should state, was a person of fierce will and strong passions, and in early life had been respectably situated. "Just step into her cell," I continued, "upon some excuse or other, and carelessly drop a hint that if she could prevail upon Jackson to get her brought by _habeas_ before a judge in London, there could be no doubt of her being bailed." The man stared, but after a few words of pretended explanation, went off to do as I requested. He was not long gone. "She's all in a twitteration at the thoughts of it," he said; "and must have pen, ink, and paper without a moment's delay, bless her consequence!"